After pondering Your question of yesterday, I can only see a “trimming” in the sense that, because You’ve become a better writer, better at pacing, You’d go over the basic plot-outlines ( for me Nicole/Felicity needs a creative solution that makes the poster II bought, reality. Alex has to find Nasti’s parents, Dan/Merlin has to be adressed properly) and see if some condensing is needed here&there.

Cutting the chapters in half? Seems a bit excessive… I understand Your trepidation towards TDC becoming like those old, forever stretched TV-series, that went on too long.

The difference seems imho, the fact that You already plotted-out the story. While those TV-series often became a success, without the writers giving some good thought on a longer running plotline.

They were, basically, surprised, and tried to stretch their nice little mortgage-helper to the max, thereby killing the charm the series had in the first place, by introducing ever more characters, ever more villains etc. etc.

This series has enough stock in storage to go on for quite a bit. I would like to see a true story unfold afa the rest of the lingering plot-lines go.

At best You could prbably condense it to 6 or 7 chapters, but do not “cut” because of “cutting”

The pace, as it stands, is pretty good. When reading the books (physically, I mean) there’s no grinding, or “sticky” parts. They are good as is.

Why isn’t ALEX saying anything? The King elect is being awfully silent while these two women settle his fate, you’d think he’d have a comment or two to make. “Yeah, Dan and I talked about this. Until we get Nas’ parents back, settle the Nightmare Realm’s hash, AND find a way for he and Nicole to enter Dreamland, he wants to keep things are they are. You might want to listen, Niv, that’s THE KING talking and I don’t mean Elvis.”

Maybe it agrees with her? *shrugs* I don’t know, but if you think about it…the Sword hasn’t been all that talkative throughout the story. It seems content to let people figure things out on their own and only pipes in whenever it knows something they can’t learn without it’s help (i.e. the true story of Arthur).

To be fair, I get entirely where she’s coming from, and where Scott’s coming from.

I mean, don’t misunderstand me. Alex is a pretty great guy. I mean, saved Dreamland, (supposedly) killed ol’ Nic, and has a charming smile. Great guy. I mean, honestly, and I think our Lady of the Lake completely gets this.

However just because we can sympathize with him as a person doesn’t mean acting in his interests is the best, nor–admittedly–is acting in his brother’s interests the best. Nyneve is trying to get what’s best for the entirety of Dreamland, and all the kids who dream themselves there. She wants Dan in charge because he is supposed to be the true king, which she wants because the true, rightful king will rule best. (And if I’m following the Dreamland mythos correctly, such logic is entirely sound).

So she doesn’t have anything against Alex or–on a personal level for Dan–but she wants to see the world of Dreamland to be the best it can possibly be, the way it was meant to be. For however many thousands (or ten thousands, or hundred thousands…) of citizens.

To quote a great Klingon, “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.” It’s being point out in the comic that Alex and Nast are the few, and the rest of Dreamland are the many, just like el Mermaid and Merlin were the few.

Nast is just realizing that valuing her and Alex’s wants and happiness over that of Dreamland as a whole, and beating around the bush is just pushing aside everyone else’s happiness and saying “I’m making the choice that you don’t /get/ your rightful ruler, not now, because simply /I/ don’t want it to be that way.”

Ms. Mermaid here is just trying to not let up the heat to make sure she can convince Nast.

Now, all that assumes that:

1) Dan really /would/ be the best ruler, and they know it.
2) Alex and Dan /can’t/ be in Dreamland at the same time, so the only way for Dan to enter is to give up ever reentering himself. (which seems to be the operating assumption)

But hasn’t it also been said that the onld reason Dan cannot get into Dreamland and has never dreamed was because of a seal placed on the next ruler. Of course, the seal was only supposed to last while Arthur’s body still remained in the tomb….and it disappeared…….mysteriously. But the seal should still be there..the same way a mental patient who’s been lobatomized cannot be returned to full mental function. Who says the story should have a happy ending?

One thing I like about my Christian and Catholic faith is that, while the needs of the many may outweigh the needs of the few, we also hold that nothing given up in love for the good of another is ultimately lost forever or not replaced with something better. So, even if Alex and Nastajia are separated for the good of Dreamland, they can look forward to a reunion, since nothing is greater than love.

And in response to yesterday’s comments…I wasn’t suggesting you be less abrasive. 🙂 You’re entitled to your opinion. I was just pointing out that your strong reactions strike a nerve in me…probably because I decided I would like Niviene, and I want to trust what Scott has implied (that she’s got good reasons for her behavior). I still think your fish-snark is funny. 🙂

But she’s carrying this too far. She’s coming off really mean about all this, and everyone else are becoming strawmen in order to be ripped down by her and see her light.

You know what I think I think our catfish could use some of her sass right now and rip everyone a new one for being so stupid about all this. Sure Dan is the true King, but it’s not because he’s a genius, it’s because of stupid birth order, which has no bearing on who he is other than the situations surrounding their lives that set this up (especially his relationship with Alex’s journeys to Dreamland). Niviene needs to come down off her high horse.

We don’t know that the reason Dan is the rightful king is because of birth order. If that was true, some British kid would be the rightful king of Dreamland. It seems to me (and this is only a guess) that Dreamland mystically chooses the best person for the job from all over the world. It’s about the person, not when he or she was born. Alex was a good surrogate because he’s Dan’s brother and, as we have seen, has been able to be Dan’s eyes, ears, and hands in Dreamland. There is absolutely no reason that Dan, had he gotten into Dreamland, couldn’t have trained and become as good a fighter as Alex. Then the person Dreamland chose would have the full warrior tactician that Dan could be.

Oh Niviene.
Don’t pull that “I feel your pain” act. You’ve had a thousand years (kinda) to accept your decision. Leave the new lovers alone dagnabbit! Argh I know I’m not putting forth a convincing argument to have Alex stay but I blame that to sleep deprivation. In short: Me like Alex better than Dan Potter. Me want Alex to stay in happyland.

One thing that your post just made me realize, has she really had like a thousand years? Doesnt time move slower in dreamland compared to the real world? So how long has it really been? Couldnt it have been like, 10 years? 100 years? there in dreamland that has passed since Arthur’s reign?

Dreamland and, er, Wakeland time lines seem to converge over long periods. There is no telling how long one is away from Dreamland, no matter how long one’s been awake, within those particular 24 hours. But a thousand years… give or take a few hours, it’s still a thousand years.

Yeah and when the were talking about Nicodermus betrayal and taking over it was 600 years ago wasn’t? Or did they just round up cuz ike how 1000 sounds better than 998.7 years?
Scott whadup? ya got an error here.

The thing is she has been completely isolated from Dreamland and there is no evidence that’s she’s been keeping tabs on current or past events. Sure it makes sense logically, but without knowledge of the whole situation, getting rid of Alex could be the worst possible action. Dreamland is not secure in any fashion and the sudden establishment of a new leader would only serve to destabilize things. I don’t think our little mermaid here is qualified to make any sort of judgements. I also believe that she is acting partially out of jealousy.

Out of spite, I would say. She’s unhappy about her lost love and now wants the entire world to feel her pain. But their situations are completely uncomparable!

Plus, she’s willing to put Daniel’s life at risk by possibly having him wear the sword amulet, I gather? Where will he appear in Dreamland? Maybe not there, but in the Nightmare Realm? Maybe he will appear right where Alex would be waking up and let’s just say he would not be under the influence of the merfolk spell and would drown. BANG! Now that’s a plan down the drain!

She’s now urging Nastajia to give up her love with whom she has been reunited and shared only several weeks or maybe a month or two and is comparing that to her “loss”???
Niviene shared an entire lifetime with Merlin. Or is she really that daft and thought Merlin would be immortal? He would pass away eventually and she’d be alone one way or another — but it’s not like she could do anything about it.

Plus, a thousand years have passed. It’s not like Arthur’s plans have any relevance in the world today. At best, Americans would invade to look for oil.

Seriously, Niviene is completely deluded. Yes, maybe Dreamland does need Daniel as king, but it has done without a king for a thousand years, it could do for another ten or twenty. The plans might not pan out at all. So why does she want to separate them? Out of spite?

I don’t think it’s that she wants to separate Alex and Nastajia…but that she’s trying to point out that they are being motivated by selfish reasons not to consider bring Dan over into Dreamland to be the true king. I honestly don’t see how it would benefit her in any way to split up the two lovebirds if that was her main focus. Some may say it’s out of spite because she can’t be with Merlin, but that’s a bit ridiculous (imo). She knows that Merlin isn’t truly gone…he’s just “hibernating” in a tree in France. 🙂

Let’s agree to disagree. Thing is, Merlin might be hibernating, but let him come out of hibernation and how much life does he have left? A year? A month? He’s not immortal, after all, or he wouldn’t have had to hibernate.

Reasons for separating them? I say it’s only out of spite and a false sense of a mission. She has no idea what has been happening in Dreamland or on Earth and yet she is convinced that Merlin’s, Arthur’s and her plan are still in effect and the best for both worlds alike.

I am much amused, I would have though our”quick-witted” hero would have mumbled something along the lines of “um, becuase we don’t know how and were hoping to hind her parents and they might know”. THough granted I suspect getting properly scolded by someone that could be your great great grandmother, is probably going to make dear Alex feel like a 5 year old caught with his hand in a cookie jar.

Problem with Alex is that while he’s likeable enough, he’s more dim-witted than quick-witted.

Nevertheless, the only thing Niviene accomplished is anguish in Nastajia who will now push Alex away from herself because she will feel it’s wrong to be in love and the only acceptable state for her is sadness. She has the potential to reach and surpass Niviene in her spitefulness by the end of the next, if not this one, chapter.

I’m sorry lady, but Alex didn’t take the kingship by force, not is Dan out of the loop.

The fact remains, Dan cannot enter dreamland. They have attempted it and failed.
They have not slacked intheir duty. If anything Dan is just as involved in this as Alex despite being unable to enter dreamland. Everyone knows that Alex is more of a steward, so maybe mermaid girl needs to take a chill pill 😉

Actually, they have not attempted to get Dan into Dreamland. They failed with Nicole, not with Dan. Dan turned down the opportunity because he knew Dreamland needed Alex’s brawn, since he has not been trained as a fighter and wouldn’t have been any help in the war physically. Planning the entire attack plan could be done from our world and shared with Dreamlanders.

First I am NOT disagreeing with u it is just that Dan discribed his reason as they just don’t know what will happen if he does take the necklace.
I think that is when the sword is a one way transfer only.

Whoa, a lot happens when you’re gone. I come back to see that there are discussion whether to condense the story or not.

Being an aspiring writer and having written and led RPG sessions I feel that a story is a living thing that will end when it’s ready. This is always up to the creator and the story since the creator knows where he/she wants the story to go.

If “trimming the fat” is demanded by the story to avoid getting drawn out, then fine, but as Tkrain wrote on the previous page “remember that on a good cut of steak, the flavor’s in the fat.”. I trust you, Scott, to do what feels right for you since it is your story to tell. 🙂

The only one thing more I would say to this is that as impatient as WE are to read this and find all the secrets to your world doesn’t mean u should get impatient.
The worst hurried comic I ever read was a manga called Blue Dragon – Ral Grad (entirely different from the anime)The story plot was intrigueing, the art fantastic, characters interesting. but Spoiler Alert
after all the build up to the end it just ended too fast. It and a some what bettersweet ending that had nothing to do with the rushing but the rushing made it something of a dissapointment still good just “After all THAT? the main generals AND the the main villain got beat in ONE DAY? and u don’t even get see the genrals get killed?”
But then again I am bais cuz as I am sure ur other fans are I want ur comic to last awhile.

I am totally expecting a sudden turn of events now, where we find out that Niviene has ulterior motives and is a bad guy. Maybe it’s all of you guys commenting, but I’m getting bad-guy vibes now… all her facial expressions now look like they’re hiding something… Or it could just be the light eyes.

*sigh* I am getting REALLY tired of Niviene pulling the Martyrdom card (don’t change a thing, Scott, I’m so annoyed with her because I can almost believe the character as an actual person! I’m not complaining about your writing!). As others have already pointed out yesterday, Niviene got to spend so much time with Merlin, watching him grow old before she had to give him up. The same isn’t true for Nastajia and Alex. Furthermore, it’s not like Niviene’s been a shining beacon of community involvement. She gave up Merlin and … then what? She’s been sitting in her hidey-hole for hundreds of years playing “Mirror mirror on the wall”! She’s completely out of touch with what is going on. For someone who wasn’t supposed to be King and is also rather derpy (sorry!) he has taken on a remarkable amount of responsibility. And, I may be remembering this wrong, but didn’t Alex’s brother admit that he didn’t really want to be king? He just wants to see Dreamland, which is not the same thing. Meanwhile, Alex is doing the best job an inexperienced person person could do in a job they never asked for and weren’t raised to undertake.I’m not quite sure why Niviene thinks she knows best after sitting on the sidelines for hundreds of years. If she had been a bit more involved with Dreamland post-Merlin, I might have been able to understand her advice a bit more. But despite the fact that she is trying to say she cares, what she really seems to be is jealous because Nastajia gets to have a king and keep him too. In the final panel of the previous page she even pouted to try and get her point across! Sheesh! (/end anti-Niviene rant)

Actually, I really trust Nastajia’s, Alex’s and Dan’s judgement regarding this issue. Niviene isn’t the last word. She can tell them what she thinks is right, but ultimately, it will be the young ones who make the decisions. And they’ve all shown (on the big ticket items) remarkably good judgement throughout the story. They’re all good hearted. Dan has already given up one opportunity to go to Dreamland…because it wouldn’t have been the best thing for Dreamland at the time. A hallmark of a true king. I believe we’ll see the same kind of sacrifice from Nastajia and Alex.

But that doesn’t mean we won’t get our happy ending, folks. 🙂 What’s a good adventure without the possibility that all may be lost?

*And the stadium gets up for a standing obation*
yeah good point how many heros all over the world had scenes where the possibility or even the true belief that they are gone, dead or just won’t make it in time only appear and succeed at the last moment have we seen? Even Superman for all is worth was given kriptonite and made vurnable to magic just to humanize him through weakness.

You know who I would love to speak up against fish lady (yea, I have pretty much lost any respect for her and wouldn’t lose any sleep if she never came back into the story or was relevant ever again), I would love to see Felicity speak up. She is an actual citizen of Dreamland, she has lived her life under Nic’s thumb, knows the hardships the Dreamlanders had to go through and has helped, risked her life and seen the changes Alex and Staj have brought about to bring back peace to Dreamland. Hmmm, thinking about it like that, Felicity has done MORE in the past few months then fishlady (yea, I refuse to use her name, that is how much I dislike her) has done in the last 1000 years.

Felicity can sort of be the voice of the Dreamlanders, who can say whether or not they even really NEED a new king all of a sudden, because taking out Alex and planting in Dan in such a troubling time (yea things are better but far from good) would probably just throw Dreamland into more turmoil. Maybe one day, if Dan can enter Dreamland without having to kick out Alex permanantly, Dan can be the king, but today is not the day.

What makes a good King? Was Nicodemus realy that bad? I didn’t realy now something about hungry or sad People, even the little humans who lives at night there. Maybe the thing with the nightmare but we did not know much about the background about here existence and there doing. A thinking I realy miss the hole novel on my self. Realy interesting, what makes one brother better then the other? We not know that.

I really hope this is a test for Alex. To see if he is ready and willing to accept being king. That it is something he wants to do and not just forced upon him. Maybe both the Niviene planed this all out as a test.

for all that is being said about who is king and who isn’t king, none of it matters, because they don’t choose the king, the sword does, and they can cry and whine all they want… if the sword still wants Alex, the Alex will be the king till the sword decides different.

I think the next words that Alex should speak are “I promised Nastajia that I would help her find her parents. Once that is done, we’ll sort the rest out. It has waited this long, it can wait a bit longer.”

Still thinking that Niviene’s got no standing here. “Alex, you have personal connections here, previous experience, training, renown, and a fantastic support team… But your bro is two minutes older than you so kthxbye, kk?”

You know what, you want to cut your chapters down, do it. You want to wreck your story line and introduce side characters as main characters, you can do it. I’ll just unbookmark your page. To me the story ended with the dragon. I know you didn’t show him die for a reason, but really, if all you’re going to do is pull a stunt like Wapsi Squared did and change the main character’s personality radically only to retcon it a few months later because of fan hate, just save yourself the trouble and just sideline Alex and have him be silent in the background while you make Dan the main character. Just don’t split them up because you want to do some half baked Great Expectations on us in the final chapters of the story.

I don’t know who this mermaid chick is. I don’t know what Merlin’s Great Plan of whatever the heck is or why it matters. I don’t know why we spent the last few months in this location much less why we haven’t left to go find the parents yet. I’d forgotten why we had even gone to this chick, much less why we care what she thinks? You never addressed why her opinion matters, you haven’t introduced this grand master plan yet. YOU HAVEN’T GIVEN US, THE AUDIENCE THE GRAND MASTER PLAN. You can’t do that in a story that’s about to END. Don’t introduce new plots just prior to the grand conclusion. You need to be wrapping them up. This is terrible writing. i don’t care what happened to Merlin, I don’t care what happened to Arthur. I just want this story to end. And why does anyone care what this mystical ‘no one knew even existed lady thinks?’ She’s just some poorly written overly wordy Miss Havisham ripoff. I just don’t care about her. Just tell us where the parents are and MOVE ON. Please. And because Arther’s plans have so much applicability to today’s world….”Hi, I’m Dan, and i’m going to rule the world because i’m the incarnation of King Arthur…hey put me down, I’m not crazy, I’M NOT CRAZY…Look, I’ve got Excallibur…Oh god, they’re shooting at me…blamblamblam, the blood, oh the bloooo….”

It may seem that way when it’s drawn out, day by day, but please keep in mind: we are seeing a book written one day at a time, that just happens to be presented online. While many of us may think of this one more stop on our daily web comic circuit, Scott is ultimately writing books here. Going through this story at a faster pace would make these changes flow a little better, I think.

I’m not sure why you feel the story is that close to ending. There are too many unfinished plot points for it to be over…and I don’t think that Scott is trying to change the main character of the story over to Dan. He’s trying to introduce a situation that will build Alex’s character further. You’re making a lot of assumptions about this story with incomplete information. As you said, Scott hasn’t given us the grand master plan…so we don’t know how much of the story remains. You may feel like defeating Nicodemus was the big climactic ending, but given what we learned about the Nightmare Realm’s involvement, several readers have postulated that there might be another figure there who was manipulating old Nic. *shrugs*

We’ve never seen that realm. We haven’t dealt with the wraiths who can affect the real world. We haven’t seen the mysterious race of “guardians.” We haven’t found Nastajia’s parents. We haven’t resolved the reunion between Felicity and Nicole. We haven’t handled Dan’s desire to go to Dreamland. There’s a lot of story left to be told. If you don’t like it being given to us little by little so we don’t have surprises ruined, then you are welcome to stop reading it…but I’m pretty sure the rest of us would rather avoid spoilers and let Scott do his thing.

Pretty sure the intent is to cut down on “side” stories like this one, if anything, not the main plot.

“I don’t know who this mermaid chick is. I don’t know what Merlin’s Great Plan of whatever the heck is or why it matters. I don’t know why we spent the last few months in this location much less why we haven’t left to go find the parents yet. I’d forgotten why we had even gone to this chick, much less why we care what she thinks?”

They went here because Niviene was basically their best lead. And by best lead I mean that she was tied to Merlin, who the cast now knows to be “real” in their universe, and he therefore might have some sort of information to pass on about ANYTHING that might be useful. On the Guardians, the Sky World, the link between Dreamland and Earth… Bear in mind that the cast is seriously out of leads on anything else, to the point that their plan before coming here was “fly around aimlessly on an airship until something vaguely interesting is found”.

They’re looking up any leads they can, while their current best plan is proceeding as fast as it can (as they only have the one airship), and they’re not in a rush over it, considering that it feels to them like a chance to finally take things slowly and calmly since they started fighting Nicodemus in the first place.

So unless you get some blatant Plot Device pointing them exactly where they need to go, the fact that they’re where they are, doing what they’re doing, is hardly implausible. It may not be that way to you, but looking up their own previously erased history AND learning more about getting around the barriers between Dreamland and Earth is actually seriously important to the main cast.

I know I’m trying to argue that Niviene really isn’t making logical sense here (“we must have the first born in to be king because THAT’S HOW IT ALWAYS WORKED” “well, I have all these accomplishments, all these companions, and all this experience already, and he doesn’t -” “IT IS YOUR DUTY”) but uh… you’re coming across as pretty entitled or something here.

I mean, even if there WERE just four chapters left, wouldn’t that be about a year or more to go, yet?